The Occident flour has a protein content of only 12.4% so that might help explain the slight stickiness in the dough at a hydration value of 65%. You might have to go to a higher protein flour to get rid of the stickiness or reduce the hydration of your recent dough formulation by a percent or two. As for the bottom crust, you may have to use considerably more corn oil in the pan to get the crust to "fry". If that doesn't do the trick, then you might consider getting the same type of pan that Jet's uses, along with a companion lid.

Peter

Peter,

Thanks for posting what I can try. I will add more corn oil to the pan next week to see if the bottom crust will fry. My pans might not be seasoned enough yet, since I recently purchased them. If all else fails, I will see about purchasing a pan like Jetís uses, along with a companion lid. I can see using a conveyor oven could also make a difference in how the bottom crust browns. I will have to read over the Buddyís and Shields threads again and see how they get their bottom crusts to brown.

I think I can speak for the other taste testers, that we all really liked how this attempt tasted. It was almost like eating a cloud, but I want to be able to get the bottom crunch, just to see how it tastes.

It's an Earth food. They are called Swedish meatballs. It's a strange thing, but every sentient race has its own version of these Swedish meatballs! I suspect it's one of those great universal mysteries which will either never be explained, or which would drive you mad if you ever learned the truth.

It's an AT&T commercial that features Jet's Pizza. In the commercial, you see some of the insides of their operations. They stretch out a dough ball and at 0:06, it looks like the skin is fully opened and in a pan and it is being scored with a knife in many long slashes as the pan is turned.

I've never seen anything like this. Docking on steroids? or something else?

I didn't find any mention of this in here with a search, but I have not been following this thread, so please forgive me if it has been covered.

That is a thin round pizza of some sort. I'd guess one of their specialty pies or maybe even a dessert pie. The jet's right around the corner from me has an open kitchen, and I've never seen them do that, and they certainly don't on the detroit style pizza that seems to be the object of most posts. It's darn odd for pizza, although it is common in bread.

Hi everybody. It is this thread that brought me here. Jets pizza is pretty much the only pizza I will eat if given the choice. Buddy's is okay, Pizza Hut is okay... "Happy's" is atrocious... Jets just has that "certain something" that nobody else has. The texture, the taste - perfection!I've been eating it since I was a little boy living less than a mile from the original "Jets Party Store" at 14 Mile & Ryan. Back then they sold it by the slice at the "back counter" of the party store. It was awesome. Watching them go from that single party store selling pizza by the slice to a chain the size and popularity of Jet's today is awesome - a true American example of greatness rewarded with success.

I'm posting in here because I am planning on making a go of this - I eat Jets for dinner almost every Saturday night (Small Square Pizza, extra cheese, with Mushrooms and Black Olives, plus a small order of Jet Bread). I'd like to see how close I can get to replicating it.

My first sticking point: In the post earlier from the Jets manager, he said the dry ingredients mix for mixing with the 16 quarts of water was "1 cup sugar, 1 cup salt, 1 cup yeast" - and then he says "add your flour" - but he doesn't specify how much flour. Can we get a more clear measurement/ratio of these dry ingredients? Any ideas?

There are still a lot of loose ends in this project. Also, we have reached somewhat a stalemate for lack of information needed to do the job properly. I usually take this to mean that people really aren't interested, or least not interested enough to pitch in to help fill in the missing blanks. Some people will offer to do things and profess their love for Jet's pizza but do not deliver.

As an example of what I have encountered in this project, I have not been able to square what I know about the Jet's dough with the Jet's Nutrition Facts. It may be because some Jet's stores are using pan sizes that are different from what Jet's was using before there was a problem--now apparently resolved--with sourcing the pans. If different pans are being used in some Jet's stores, that will mean different quantities of cheese and sauce and different nutrition facts. As you may have noted, I was given pan information initially by a Jet's store manager in Texas that was different than what I later learned. It is quite common for employees of pizza places to dispense information that turns out to be wrong or incomplete. As a result, I tend to take what is told to me with a grain of salt and try to find the answers, or at least try to confirm what is told to me, through things like Nutrition Facts and public documents that I am able to uncover through searches.

For the time being, you might try Norma's stab at the Jet's clone. If you do not have the same pan size you should be able to use the expanded dough calculating tool at http://www.pizzamaking.com/expanded_calculator.html to modify Norma's dough formulation for your particular pan size.

To my memory, Jets "square pizza" has always been rectangular, for as long as I remember. We regularly get them for family parties/etc.. and as I said, I often get a small one on Sat night (although, ironically, last night I did not LOL). I don't remember them ever being an actual "square", even though - admittedly - we do call it "square pizza". so I tend to think that your 8" x 10" is probably correct for the small.

At this point - is there anything I can do to help further the project. What "eyewitness" info do you need? I can walk in pretty much anytime, there are 3 locations within 3 miles of my house (one of those being 'the original party store location') and in fact next Sat I'm planning on getting one anyways.

To my memory, Jets "square pizza" has always been rectangular, for as long as I remember. We regularly get them for family parties/etc.. and as I said, I often get a small one on Sat night (although, ironically, last night I did not LOL). I don't remember them ever being an actual "square", even though - admittedly - we do call it "square pizza". so I tend to think that your 8" x 10" is probably correct for the small.

At this point - is there anything I can do to help further the project. What "eyewitness" info do you need? I can walk in pretty much anytime, there are 3 locations within 3 miles of my house (one of those being 'the original party store location') and in fact next Sat I'm planning on getting one anyways.

Tommy,

Thank you for your offer to help.

I will accept whatever information you can provide. I believe that you are correct that the small square Jet's pizza is made in an 8" x !0" pan.

The kind of information that would be most useful is the dimensions and weight of a basic small square pan pizza from Jet's and also any information on the amount of sauce and cheese used. The dimensions would be the dimensions of the top and bottom surfaces of the pizza and its depth (measured on either on a slant or vertically), and the weight would be the weight of the baked pizza. The easiest pizza to analyze from a reverse engineering and cloning standpoint is a plain cheese pizza, simply because it has the fewest ingredients. Next would be a pepperoni pizza provided that the number of pepperoni slices are counted. Measuring the diameter of a typical pepperoni slice would also be helpful. To facilitate the measurements, I usually advise that the pizza purchased be uncut.

I would prefer that the weight of the pizza be taken as soon after purchase as possible although if you live near the Jet's store that should be OK since the loss in weight of a just baked pizza is quite small over a short travel distance. For reasons of accuracy, I prefer that the weight be in grams if possible.

Getting an idea as to the amount of sauce and cheese used on a given pizza is one of the hardest parts of the exercise. I typically watch the utensils used to measure out pizza sauce, like Spoodle or similar portioning control devices, and I note the color of the handle if such a device is used since many such devices are color coded as to the bowl volume. Asking a worker how much sauce and cheese is used on the pizza is also a good idea (like: "Out of curiosity, how much sauce and cheese do you put on a small square pepperoni cheese pizza?" and "How many pepperoni slices are you supposed to put on a small square pizza?") and you might get an answer if the worker has been properly trained. Or if you are in a position to observe the pizza being assembled, you might use your best estimate as to the amounts of sauce and cheese used.

Whenever I am in a pizza establishment trying to gather information, I pay close attention to what the people are doing and how they make the pizzas. I might even try to time the duration of the bake although workers will often tell you what that time is if asked. I also look at what equipment and other items are on hand, including coolers, mixers, bags of flour, cans of tomatoes, etc. Of course, often these items are not in the view of customers.

At least I made the attempt at a Jetís pizza after my MMís attempt, so the Jetís attempt pictures werenít deleted. Although I used the same formula as I used in my last attempt, and only changed the flour to Better for Bread, my last attempt with Occident flour was better in my opinion. I used manteca to oil my pan, but guess shouldnít have used that as the oil either. The taste of the Jetís attempt was good, but still didnít have the crunch on the bottom of the pizza like a Jetís pizza does.

You can take a measurement of thickness at the middle. I just want to have a rough idea. An average thickness would also be good.

I am more interested at this point in the amounts of sauce and cheese for a small square pizza (and number of pepperoni slices if a pepperoni pizza is purchased) than the weight of the baked crust. I hate to ask you to remove everything from the pizza to weight the crust only, although you might be able to replace most of the lost sauce and the cheese and reheat the reconstructed pizza before cutting. Hopefully if you are able to get the amounts of sauce and cheese used there won't be any need to desecrate the pizza.

I plan to be out of town soon and through the weekend, so I may not be in a position to react to your findings until early next week.

1.) Will ask for measurement amounts of sauce and cheese from employee.2.) Will order 1 small "square" cheese pizza. Uncut.3.) Will take it immediately home and weigh it.4.) Will measure it across top - both ways.5.) Will measure it across bottom - both ways.6.) Will measure it's thickness in the middle, and at 4 "half-way out from middle" points.7.) IF they have not given me the measurements for sauce and cheese, then I will "desecrate" (lol) and try to get weights of just cheese, and then just dough with everything "scraped off" .. (will be a little hard to weigh the sauce). No worries here, I can order two pizzas if I cannot bear the loss of this one or don't think I can re-construct lol... best part here is the wife and children will be out of town, I will be home alone. That way I won't be committed to the insane asylum for doing this, either.

I will try to look at equipment/ladles/etc... if I can see, but I know from experience that that stuff is fairly well concealed (by design or otherwise) from the visiting public.